Hello. This is my first post here - and my first time tiling. I am in the midst of a bathroom remodel. My contractor framed the walls and installed Schluter film in the shower. We subsequently fired him, and I am now working with what was left to complete the project.

I have tiled the bathroom and shower walls with ~2" hex tile that is slightly concave. I am down to a single outside corner, and I am stuck. The primary issue is that the framing was poorly done, the hardie board was sloppy, and the schluter film is sloppy. That has left me with a poorly defined corner with an approximate 1/2" radius. It has also made the spacing inconsistent.

In essence, I have room for just over a single tile in a column up the wall. I am able to work around the spacing by cutting them carefully one by one. The real issue is that because the corner is rounded, there is nothing to set the tile pieces to - and they don't line up well.

I looked at using a piece of schluter aluminum to create a border (you can see it in the picture), but because of the poor corner, the aluminum has nothing to be set against. If it were 1/2" wider it might work. Really, it needs to attach to both sides of the wall and define a corner.

So that's really my question - is there a way to build a corner over the schluter membrane? Some sort of concrete that would adhere, and be sufficiently strong? or an angled corner bead that would work? Something short of chopping out the wall and redoing it.

If you didn't already have the tile set on both sides, you might have some other options, but that's one of the things I would want on hand before setting any tile, so you wouldn't run into this kind of a problem.

Off the top of my head, the only thing I can come up with is a tile quarter round. It would set to the corner fairly easily with thinset mortar. You can find them at many tile stores, although you'd probably have to order some from the big box stores. Hopefully you can find a color that will work for you.

In a few hours, when the non-night-owls are awake, someone else might have another suggestion that would suit you better.

I'd peel those 2 rows off that are installed on the short return wall and install a schluter strip. I don't see how the rounded corner would be an issue? I'd be more concerned with damaged the kerdi while removing the tile.

I think the picture is deceiving - if I use miter cuts on the tile, the piece on the left is about 1.75" wide while the one on the right is about 3/4". Because of the rounded corner, the schluter strip does not have any flat wall to touch. And, the tile on the right is only connected in ~3/8" point at best, which is not enough to support it.

I took a trip to the local tile expert store and hangout today to get some advice for this and other issues. We came up with using Kerdi Board ZW angle profile and a mess of X77 to build up and define a corner. That should give me an actual corner upon which to place tile. I'll likely need to trim it in places on the right to account for the existing tile corners, but that seems like less work than pulling those tiles down and fixing the then damaged Kerdi behind it.

The downside is that the profile adds thickness which will make the tiles sit proud, but I think I can us a diamond blade to grind them down a tad. Then, I'll use a 1/8" aluminum rod as a spacer to define the corner width, and then fill it in with caulk.

Not an easy situation now but when doing silly little mosaics, I will usually install the metal strips before tile work. Wall can be flattened according to the height of the trim strip with no need to grind down tiny tiles and risk finger damage. The strips then also serve as a clean edge to mark and cut to.

This project has just moved from problematic, to potentially disastrous ...

Our contractor installed a floor heat mat and covered it with a self leveler. I then installed floor tile, which was 3/4" unglazed porcelain mosaic. After it was down, I decided I didn't really like it, ad since it is only about 1/8" thick, I figured it would be easier to simply tile over it. I also needed to build up a few spots where the contractor had mistakenly not filled in the leveler. To that end, my friendly local tile store suggested Ardex feather fill.

I did that, and it seemed to go OK. That was about a month ago. However, before installing the new floor, for reasons I am not sure I can explain, I decided to test the feather fill with water ... and it turned to mud. The feather fill expired in January of 2015. It was fresh enough that it is down and will be near impossible to get out, but it is bad enough that it does not make for a stable substrate.

The manufacturer warranties that product for 9 months after the manufacture date if unopened. If you determined that the product "expired" early in 2015, it clearly was not considered usable by the manufacturer.

You indicate that it "turned to mud" with the application of water. If that's the case, why would you not be able to add water and remove all you've installed by simply cleaning off the "mud"?

It is definitely Feather Finish. The supplier (Belknap White) recommended it to me and sold it to me. They sold two bags of it to someone else while I was there, so it does not seem to be a low turnover item. But they definitely sold me an old bag.

When I say it turns to mud, it does not all turn to mud. Enough of it does to indicate that it is not properly set up, and that it will cause issues down the line. But enough if it is set up that removal is non-trivial. The floor is 40 square feet, covered in 3/4" mosaic, and the Ardex is in all of the grout lines.

The corner has been addressed. I screwed a long piece of wood to one side. Then I installed the small pieces of tile to the other with a lot of thinset. After it dried, I removed the wood (coated in packing tape so the thinset didn't bond to it) and filled in the remaining gaps with more thinset. This gave me a flat surface upon which I could epoxy in the schluter metal piece. Once the epoxy cured, I was able to thinset in the other side of the tile.

The feather finish has been hopefully dealt with, too. Maybe. The date code actually says it is only 3 months old (the 2015 date seems to be the package printing date.) I got yelled at by both the Belknapp White manager, and an Ardex rep, for questioning the quality of their product, which was delightful. They said were going to send a sample back to Ardex for "testing" which I am sure happened. In the meantime, we dumped water on the whole floor and scraped up what we could with a putty knife. This seems to have left a decent enough surface to adhere the new tile to. We'll sand it next.

But basically - we either rip it out now, or we tile the floor and hope for the best, with the possibility that we have to rip it out later. So in essence we're betting the cost of the new tile that the floor is OK.

I am up to the grouting phase, and I am having trouble figuring out my best strategy. In one place, we used an unglazed ceramic mosaic. It is pretty rough and almost feels like limestone in texture. I am concerned that the grout is going to stick to the top of the tile and be impossible to remove - this is particularly so as I am intending to use an epoxy grout.

I assumed the best option was to use a penetrating sealer for the tile both to seal it and to act as a grout release agent. However, I am concerned that it will get in between the tile and thus prevent the grout from adhering at all.

Is grout sticking to the top of unsealed tile, or not sticking to the sides of sealed tile an issue? Is there a good solution here? The tile is 2% absorbent, so it's a little porous but not horribly so. Mortar is definitely tricky to get off the top.

There are about 6000 of these little tiles, so individually sealing them is not my first choice.